Gryphon Success at Meltwater

By Rob Massey

Kevin Campbell recalls a play from the final Homecoming Game of his five-year stint with the Guelph Gryphons.It was 2011 and the Gryphs were playing the McMaster Marauders. A receiver, Campbell had hauled in a pass from quarterback Jazz Lindsey when he running started upfield.“I caught an out pass and the defender was coming at me,” he said during a telephone interview. “I had either the option I run through him or I jump over him and I chose to jump over him. It was a big hurdle in 2011 that I still talk about to this day.”There was also a photo of it that Campbell kept as a profile picture on Facebook for a number of years.Now Campbell is a sales manager with Meltwater, a company founded in Norway in 2001 that helps companies and associations track their publicity.“We help communications and marketing departments,” Campbell said. “Essentially, we track their brand. Anytime the companies are mentioned in the news and on social media, we’re able to pick it up online and then track it for you.”Meltwater works with anything from big companies to smaller associations.“Everyone needs to know about their names in the news,” Campbell said.work with U of GThe University of Guelph is one of their clients.Meltwater also has an affinity for hiring former Gryphon athletes, especially football players. Campbell is one of four former pigskin Gryphons who are on staff, the others being Carl Trivieri, Taylor Palmer and Vince Lonsdale and all are managers within the company. Former Gryphon track athlete Ray Cadeau is also at Meltwater.“The reason why there are so many athletes, football guys and track guys, that work for this company is that it’s very team orientated,” Campbell said. “You’re constantly working with people and everyone’s really driving for that same goal here at Meltwater. It’s actually been voted one of the best places to work in the last year, too, because it is really team orientated. Everyone’s really focused on that main goal to be successful.”The four former football players are all based in different cities, but communicate almost on a daily basis. Campbell’s in Toronto, Trivieri’s in Washington, Palmer’s in Montreal and Lonsdale’s in Vancouver.“The great thing with Meltwater is even though we’re all working out of different offices, we’re all focused on that same goal,” Campbell said. “It’s really open communication. Everyone’s working together and looking for that one goal, to really be successful. We’re constantly bouncing ideas off of each other, constantly talking with each other about things that are going on with work.”As a varsity athlete, Campbell had to have self discipline in order to keep up with his schoolwork with the time-consuming demands of football games, practices and off-season workouts.“That definitely has something to do with it,” he said. “The biggest thing that I’ve found that really coincides with the both is just the competitive nature. This is a job where you really want to drive and try to be your best day in and day out. It’s also a very ambitious place to work, too. Going in, you really can control what you can control. If you want to be successful at Meltwater, you get what you put in and that’s really what I found playing with Guelph. The harder you work, the better you’ll be.”After finishing his studies in history at the University of Guelph, Campbell spent three years in Korea teaching English.“It was definitely something different, going over there and experiencing a new culture,” he said. “It was a good little gap between playing football and then kind of entering that real world because you got to do some traveling and see some things. Yeah, I’d definitely recommend it to anyone else that’s looking to do something like that.”Campbell played five seasons with the Gryphs, his first three under head coach Kyle Walters and last two with Stu Lang as head coach. In his final two seasons when he became the escape clause for Lindsey, the receiver the quarterback would look to first when he got in a jam, Campbell caught 34 passes for 542 yards and three touchdowns. He also had 17 rushes for 105 yards and another TD and returned four kicks for 36 yards. On special teams, he had seven tackles and forced a fumble.He was on campus last month for a career fair at the University Centre and he managed to get over to Alumni Stadium.“I couldn’t believe the changes that were happening,” he said. “The field looks absolutely beautiful. Just the way that they did the outside of the stadium, too. When you first walk up to it, with the black, it really seems that the culture has changed since the last time that I was there. Even going up to the weight room, it looks like a first-class facility now. It’s really changed a lot in a positive swing.”Campbell figures a player looking to get into university and play football can’t go wrong choosing to the University of Guelph.“I’d definitely recommend it,” he said. "Obviously the program is the program. They have a great program going on there. It’s always successful and always competitive.“But the big thing about Guelph is just the campus and actual city itself. A, it seems they really do support the football team now in terms of showing up for the games and getting behind the team. Last time I was there I saw the tailgate that was put on. It seemed like there was a lot of people from the actual city going to that. Actually going to the campus — I like to describe it that it’s a big campus in a small town. You can easily access all the buildings. It’s only about a 10-minute walk across the entire campus. And the actual city itself, everything’s close and everything’s great to be around.”